In television receivers, analog broadcasts are gradually degraded in image quality (hereinafter referred to as “receive image quality”) as the receive state becomes poorer. On the other hand, degradation in receive image quality of digital broadcasts is not observed even if the receive state becomes poor until it exceeds limitations in an error correcting capability of a television receiver. That is, the receive state and the receive image quality in analog broadcasts, and those in digital broadcasts respectively have a relationship as shown in FIG. 12. From this, it can be said that the receive image quality in digital broadcasts is less prone to be affected by the receive state than that in analog broadcasts. In a case of digital broadcasts, however, the receive quality is rapidly degraded when the receive image state becomes so poor as to exceed the limitations in the error correcting capability of the television receiver. Moreover, when the receive state becomes so poor as to exceed the error correcting capability, digital broadcast television receivers are generally formed so as not to carry out video display.
The receive state in television broadcasting using a satellite or a ground wave is affected by weather. Therefore, when a television program is preset for recording by a VCR, etc., the image quality of recorded video is affected by weather during the broadcast time period of the program. Particularly, in a case where a digital broadcast program is preset for recording, if the receive state will become so poor as to exceed the limitations in the error correction capability of the television receiver due to bad weather during the broadcast time period of the program that is desired for preset recording, it is practically impossible to record the program. Some digital broadcasts require a fee, and therefore the desire can be considered particularly strong to prevent a situation in which recording of the program that is preset for recording is practically impossible due to bad weather.
Furthermore, in a case of drawing up a schedule for viewing a certain program to be aired as a digital broadcast, it will be convenient to know in advance the possibility of degradation in receive image quality due to bad weather during the broadcast time period of the program.
Therefore, an object of the present invention is to provide a digital broadcast recording/viewing support apparatus which is capable of reliably recording or viewing a program that is scheduled to be aired as a digital broadcast.